hadn’t the consciousness of guilt to buoy me up. What hour did you say he fixed?
GUIDO Noon. [Clock in the Cathedral strikes.]
ASCANIO It is that now, and your man has not come. I don’t believe in him, Guido. I think it is some wench who has set her eye at you; and, as I have followed you from Perugia to Padua, I swear you shall follow me to the nearest tavern. [Rises.] By the great gods of eating, Guido, I am as hungry as a widow is for a husband, as tired as a young maid is of good advice, and as dry as a monk’s sermon. Come, Guido, you stand there looking at nothing, like the fool who tried to look into his own mind; your man will not come.
GUIDO Well, I suppose you are right. Ah! [Just as he is leaving the stage with ASCANIO, enter LORD MORANZONE in a violet cloak, with a silver falcon broidered on the shoulder; he passes across to the Cathedral, and just as he is going in GUIDO runs up and touches him.]
MORANZONE Guido Ferranti, thou hast come in time.
GUIDO What! Does my father live?
MORANZONE
Ay! lives in thee.
Thou art the same in mould and lineament,
Carriage and form, and outward semblances;
I trust thou art in noble mind the same.
GUIDO
Oh, tell me of my father; I have lived
But for this moment.
MORANZONE We must be alone.
GUIDO
This is my dearest friend, who out of love
Has followed me to Padua; as two brothers,
There is no secret which we do not share.
MORANZONE
There is one secret which ye shall not share;
Bid him go hence.
GUIDO [to ASCANIO] Come back within the hour.
He does not know that nothing in this world
Can dim the perfect mirror of our love.
Within the hour come.
ASCANIO Speak not to him,
There is a dreadful terror in his look.
GUIDO
[laughing]
Nay, nay, I doubt not that he has come to tell
That I am some great Lord of Italy,
And we will have long days of joy together.
Within the hour, dear Ascanio.
[Exit ASCANIO.]
Now tell me of my father?
[Sits down on a stone seat.]
Stood he tall?
I warrant he looked tall upon his horse.
His hair was black? or perhaps a reddish gold,
Like a red fire of gold? Was his voice low?
The very bravest men have voices sometimes
Full of low music; or a clarion was it
That brake with terror all his enemies?
Did he ride singly? or with many squires
And valiant gentlemen to serve his state?
For oftentimes methinks I feel my veins
Beat with the blood of kings. Was he a king?
MORANZONE
Ay, of all men he was the kingliest.
GUIDO [proudly]
Then when you saw my noble father last
He was set high above the heads of men?
MORANZONE
Ay, he was high above the heads of men,
[Walks over to GUIDO and puts his hand upon his shoulder.]
On a red scaffold, with a butcher’s block
Set for his neck.
GUIDO [leaping up]
What dreadful man art thou,
That like a raven, or the midnight owl,
Com’st with this awful message from the grave?
MORANZONE
I am known here as the Count Moranzone,
Lord of a barren castle on a rock,
With a few acres of unkindly land
And six not thrifty servants. But I was one
Of Parma’s noblest princes; more than that,
I was your father’s friend.
GUIDO [clasping his hand] Tell me of him.
MORANZONE
You are the son of that great Duke Lorenzo,
He was the Prince of Parma, and the Duke
Of all the fair domains of Lombardy
Down to the gates of Florence; nay, Florence even
Was wont to pay him tribute -
GUIDO Come to his death.
MORANZONE
You will hear that soon enough. Being at war -
O noble lion of war, that would not suffer
Injustice done in Italy! - he led
The very flower of chivalry against
That foul adulterous Lord of Rimini,
Giovanni Malatesta - whom God curse!
And was by him in treacherous ambush taken,
And like a villain, or a low-born knave,
Was by him on the public scaffold murdered.
GUIDO [clutching his dagger] Doth Malatesta live?
MORANZONE No, he is dead.
GUIDO
Did you say dead?
